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Soft materials, such as colloidal suspensions, polymer solutions, and biological systems, are typically multicomponent mixtures of macromolecules and simpler components (e.g., microions, monomers, solvent) that can assemble into complex…
Electrical activity of fungus \emph{Pleurotus ostreatus} is characterised by slow (hours) irregular waves of baseline potential drift and fast (minutes) action potential likes spikes of the electrical potential. An exposure of the mycelium…
The methodologies of bioinspiration, biomimetics, and bioreplication are inevitably pointing to the incorporation of multifunctionality in engineered materials when designing ever more complex systems. Optimal multifunctionality is also the…
DNA-mediated multivalent interactions between colloidal particles have been extensively applied for their ability to program bulk phase behaviour and dynamic processes. Exploiting the competition between different types of DNA-DNA bonds,…
Flagellar-driven locomotion plays a critical role in bacterial attachment and colonization of surfaces, contributing to the risks of contamination and infection. Tremendous attempts to uncover the underlying principles governing bacterial…
Materials that change their magnetic properties in response to the external stimuli have long been of interest for their potential applicability in magnetic storage device, spintronics and smart magnetic materials. Organic materials are…
Fungal protein materials exhibit inherently anisotropic microstructures formed by networks of hyphae, which suggest a natural pathway to replicate the fibrous texture of animal meat. We probe whether this structural anisotropy translates…
How systems are endowed with migration capacity is a fascinating question with implications ranging from the design of novel active systems to the control of microbial populations. Bacteria, which can be found in a variety of environments,…
Incorporating functional molecules into sensor devices is an emerging field in molecular electronics that aims at exploiting the sensitivity of different molecules to their environment and turning it into an electrical signal. Among the…
The manipulation of biological substrates is becoming more popular route towards generating novel computing devices. Physarum polycephalum is used as a model organism in biocomputing because it can create `wires' for use in hybrid circuits;…
Compliant environments can mediate interactions between mechanically active cells like fibroblasts. Starting with a phenomenological model for the behaviour of single cells, we use extensive Monte Carlo simulations to predict non-trivial…
Soft and biological matter come in a variety of shapes and geometries. When soft surfaces that do not fit into each other due to a mismatch in Gaussian curvatures form an interface, beautiful geometry-induced patterns emerge. In this paper,…
Thanks to a constant energy input, active matter can self-assemble into phases with complex architectures and functionalities such as living clusters that dynamically form, reshape and break-up, which are forbidden in equilibrium materials…
Colloidal gels are prime examples of functional materials exhibiting disordered, amorphous, yet meta-stable forms. They maintain stability through short-range attractive forces and their material properties are tunable by external forces.…
Photosynthetic microbes have evolved and successfully adapted to the ever-changing environmental conditions in complex microhabitats throughout almost all ecosystems on Earth. In the absence of light, they can sustain their biological…
Many active systems are capable of forming intriguing patterns at scales significantly larger than the size of their individual constituents. Cyanobacteria are one of the most ancient and important phyla of organisms that has allowed the…
Energy absorbing materials, like foams used in protective equipment, are able to undergo large deformations under low stresses, reducing the incoming stress wave below an injury or damage threshold. They are typically effective in absorbing…
Microgels are soft colloids that, in virtue of their polymeric nature, can react to external stimuli such as temperature or pH by changing their size. The resulting swelling/deswelling transition can be exploited in fundamental research as…
Biological materials achieve directional reinforcement with oriented assemblies of anisotropic building blocks. One such example is the nanocomposite structure of keratinized epithelium on the toe pad of tree frogs, in which hexagonal…
Adhesion-dependent cells actively sense the mechanical properties of their environment through mechanotransductory processes at focal adhesions, which are integrin-based contacts connecting the extracellular matrix to the cytoskeleton. Here…